PROBATION AND PAROLE’S GROWING CASELOADS AND WORKLOAD
ALLOCATION: STRATEGIES FOR MANAGERIAL DECISION MAKING
The American Probation & Parole Association
Matthew T. DeMichele
May 4, 2007
Probation and Parole’s Growing Caseloads and Workload Allocation: Strategies for
Managerial Decision Making
TABLE OF CONTENTS
Acknowledgements.……………...………………………………………………………………4
Preface.…………………………………………………………………………………………...5
Growing Workload: Evidence-Based Practices, Workload Measures, and Organizational
Development…………………………………………………………………………………….10
Supervision Goals: Punishment and Rehabilitation are Not Mutually Exclusive………….12
Growing Caseloads and Workload Allocation………………………………………………..15
From Caseload to Classrooms: What is the Right Number?.............................................18
Probation on the Eleven O’clock News.…...…………………………………………….20
Evidence-Based Practice: Looking for Effective Management……………………………...22
Evidence-Based Practices: From Shoveling Science to Better Offender
Management….…………………………………………………………………………..23
Death to Rehabilitation: Nothing Works!..........................................................................24
Not so Fast: Does Anything Work?...................................................................................26
Evidence-Based Practices: Bridging the Researcher-Practitioner
Divide…………………………………………………………………………………….27
NIC-CJI Integrated Model: Evidence-Based Practices, Organizational Development, and
Collaboration…………………………………………………………………...………..28
Evidence-Based Practices: What Are We Trying to Accomplish?.....................................30
Evidence-Based Practices: Risk, Need, and
Responsivity………………………………………………………………..…….………31
Caseload Size and Workload Allocation: Response from APPA Members………………...34
Information Request: Delivery and Collection
Approach…………………………………………………………………………………34
Information Request: Describing the Respondents………………………………………36
Community Corrections: What are Supervision Goals?...................................................40
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Workload vs. Caseload: Decision making avenues for Community Corrections……..…44
Determining Supervision Conditions…………………………………………………….47
Community Corrections Practices: How long does that take?..........................................50
Sex offenders and other high-risk Categories………………………………………..…..51
Community Corrections: A Changing Organization………………………………………...55
References……………………………………………………………………………………….63
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Acknowledgements
This report would not have been possible without the support of several key people. It is
important to thank the practitioners that participated in a focus group meeting in the Summer of
2006 including Quala Champagne (Wisconsin), Eric Arnold (Illinois), Gerald Oler (Utah), and
Saul Schoon (Arizona), as well as, Frank Domurad (Carey Group), and Mario Paparozzi
(University of North Carolina, Pembroke). Carl Wicklund, William Burrell, Brian Payne and
Mario Paparozzi offered insightful comments and suggestions on an earlier draft of this report.
The staff at the American Probation and Parole Association (APPA) also offered helpful
comments, advice, and guidance throughout the writing of this report, with Margaret Cloyd
providing formatting and editorial assistance. I wish to thank the members of APPA that took the
time to complete the web-based request for information. Drew Molloy, senior policy advisor
with the Bureau of Justice Assistance, deserves special thanks for his role in steering this project.
While the author appreciates the help of these key people and this report benefited from their
involvement, any weaknesses and errors are the sole responsibility of the author and in no way
reflect upon these helpful individuals.
This document was prepared by the American Probation and Parole Association, and supported
by cooperative agreement award number 2006-DD-BX-K023, awarded by the Bureau of Justice
Assistance, Office of Justice Programs, U.S. Department of Justice. The opinions, findings, and
conclusions or recommendations expressed in this document are those of the authors and do not
necessarily represent the official position or policies of the U.S. Department of Justice.
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PREFACE
Community corrections populations have experienced tremendous growth for the past
two decades. The Bureau of Justice Statistics Correctional Survey
(http://www.ojp.usdoj.gov/bjs/glance/tables/corr2tab.htm) reveals that probation and parole
populations have grown unabated since 1980. This growth has serious implications for probation
and parole agencies regarding how to make caseload and workload decisions. It is important to
consider differences between caseload, which is the number of offenders supervised by an
officer, and workload, which is the amount of time needed to complete various tasks. Ironically,
while caseload size will grow as offender populations increase, workload is a rather stagnant
figure as there are only so many working hours available in each day, week, month, or year for
each officer.
These issues related to workload allocation are further complicated by two additional
trends in community corrections. Probation was once a place for relatively low-level offenders
that posed little threat to public safety and were mostly in need of pro-social steering (Petersilia,
1998). In an attempt to alleviate jail and prison crowding, however, probation caseloads are
being populated with offenders that potentially pose greater community safety threats. This is a
point made by Taxman, Shephardson, and Byrne (2004: 3) in Tools of the Trade in which they
mention that “probation roles increasingly mirror the prison population” and they go on to state
that “more than half of probationers today are convicted felons.” These offenders have more
criminogenic needs as they may be gang members, sex offenders, or domestic violence
offenders, and require more officer time to provide adequate supervision, treatment, and
enforcement of conditions, and hopefully behavior change.
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A second trend facing probation and parole agencies is the growth in conditions of
supervision. These conditions are often instituted by non-community corrections professionals
such as judges, releasing authorities, and legislation. This decision making style has the potential
to foster rather standard conditions applied to offenders with little consideration of individual
offender characteristics. For instance, in many jurisdictions, regardless of an offender’s
substance abuse history, he or she must submit to periodic drug tests. This type of sanction,
while noble in its attempt to prevent drug use, may not be realistic, relevant, or based on
research, something Carl Wicklund (2004) referred to as the three-Rs of community supervision.
Karol Lucken (1997: 367) points out the potential unanticipated consequences resulting in
increased failures of what she refers to as the “piling up of sanctions” as they expose “offenders
to a number of punitive and rehabilitative controls, which often leads to violations and returns to
the correctional system.” That an external body—whether judge or releasing authority—has
much discretion in establishing supervision conditions may not be problematic in and of itself. It
becomes potentially problematic, however, when such decisions are made with little input from
presentence investigation reports or risk assessments, and otherwise in isolation from research
evidence supporting effective community corrections strategies.
The American Probation & Parole Association (APPA) has completed this report to offer
baseline data to assist policymakers and administrators in confronting workload allocation issues.
The report is not the final word in resolving workload decision making problems as caseloads
and court-ordered conditions continue to escalate. Rather, this report is seen as a needed first step
toward better understanding practitioner views toward workload allocation. This report provides
findings from an APPA web-based information request, and benefited from a focus group of
community corrections researchers, administrators, and practitioners. It is suggested that
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agencies with guidance from stakeholders in their jurisdictions must establish clearly defined
organizational goals and an overall strategy to achieve, evaluate, and adjust such strategies.
These goals are to be jurisdictionally appropriate and therefore rooted in local contextual
conditions, not necessarily global national standards. However, it does seem to be the case that
probation and parole agencies are in the business of community safety through instituting a
balanced approach of surveillance, treatment, and enforcement (see Taxman et al., 2004). This
tripartite focus is rooted in evidence-based practices that begin with assessing individual
offender’s level of risk as an indication of their probability to re-offend. It is important to note
that by suggesting that community corrections is in the business of community safety that does
not imply that officers are singly responsible for achieving this goal. Rather, it is recognized that
probation and parole outcomes are embedded in a larger multi-organizational justice system that
incorporates law enforcement, institutional corrections, and courts, and non-justice agencies
including victims of crime, treatment providers, and others.
Once probation and parole agencies define a locally acceptable goal, it is important to
institute a strategy to accomplish their organizational goal. This strategy, no doubt, involves
incorporating the many interested stakeholders involved in the justice system process through indepth collaboration. Through collaboration and an overall strategy aimed at public safety, former
New Jersey Parole Board Chair, Mario Paparozzi (2007), suggests that probation and parole can
“own their outcomes.” By owning outcomes, Paparozzi is identifying the importance for
probation and parole administrators to establish clearly defined goals related to public safety and
the community, state these goals, and institute policies and practices to achieve such outcomes.
In the event that expected outcomes do not follow, or as he put it: “If I end up on the 11 o’clock
news. You know something went wrong.” It is expected that from time to time things will go
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wrong, offenders will re-offend, there will be high profile cases receiving much media attention
to exploit the faults of probation or parole agencies. What is important, however, is for probation
and parole agencies to work to diminish recidivism by utilizing scientific or “state of the art”
procedures to bring about offender behavior change (Taxman et al., 2004). Judy Sachwald
(2004), Director of Maryland Probation and Parole, promotes a similar argument by
incorporating a model of supervision rooted in scientific exploration and knowledge of offender
behavior. She suggests that probation and parole agencies should “do it, tell it, and sell it,” with
the “it” referring to shaping policies, operations, and professional development within agencies
around scientific principles related to evidence-based practices.
There is no doubt that evidence-based practices designed to reduce risk of re-offending
are infusing the community corrections field with more scientific approaches. These approaches
rely on risk assessments to allow probation and parole agencies to differentiate and typologize
offenders based upon their relative level of risk to re-offend. This strategy allows for addressing
criminogenic needs—anti-social behavior, anti-social personality, anti-social values and
attitudes, criminal peer groups, substance abuse, and dysfunctional family relations—through an
integrated approach of surveillance, treatment, and enforcement. Although community
corrections officers must have numerous challenges to overcome, there are few issues more
central to the organization and function of probation and parole as workload allocation issues.
These issues form the base from which all other supervisory functions flow. The community
corrections field must work with the judiciary and releasing authorities as well as policymakers
to address the effect of growing caseloads of higher-risk offenders with more imposed
conditions.
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GROWING WORKLOAD: EVIDENCE-BASED PRACTICES, WORKLOAD
MEASURES, AND ORGANIZATIONAL DEVELOPMENT
Probation and parole are responsible for approximately five of the seven million adults
under correctional control (Glaze & Bonczar, 2006). The goals of corrections are varied and
sometimes in conflict with each other. Some of the central correctional goals with regard to
offenders in custodial and community settings include: punishment, pro-social behavioral
reform, public safety, and assuring justice for victims of crime. To be sure, these goals can
conflict when they are pursued simultaneously as part of an overall, or specific, correctional
strategy. However, the seemingly inherent conflicts between correctional goals wane when
approached strategically. The community corrections field has changed significantly from its
initial focus as a way to help offenders construct pro-social lives by addressing personal and
social deficits. The more contemporary view of corrections embraces strategies and services that
hold offenders accountable for their criminality, provides cost-effective alternatives to
incarceration, and never loses sight of the critical importance of public safety in the near and
long-term (Petersilia, 2003; Rhine, Smith, Jackson, 1991).
This report is intended to provide some direction for community corrections
policymakers, administrators, and line staff about workload allocation decision making.
Offenders under probation and parole supervision pose a potential threat to public safety and the
vitality of communities. The dramatic increases of the number of offenders under community
supervision in recent years makes probation and parole officer workload allocation issues a
matter of increasing concern. A traditional approach to workload issues was to conduct time
analyses within individual agencies. This approach provides definite benefits, but fails to offer
much guidance at the national level. For guidance at a national level a model for establishing
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appropriate workload standards is needed. The ideal model would provide for operational
flexibility at the local level, but strictly adhere to empirical evidence, and professionally
endorsed standards for a process that achieves locally defined goals for community corrections
services.
This report brings together several strains of research literature including organizational
studies, workload studies, and evidence-based practices. For anyone working in or around
community corrections, it is well-known that the notion of evidence-based practices provides the
field with increasing amounts of empirical support (or lack thereof) for certain types of strategies
and practices. Evidence-based practices are rooted in an applied scientific approach to determine
what interventions assist agencies in reducing recidivism levels and accomplishing various
intermediate outcomes, while maximizing resources. Intermediate outcomes refer to offenders
completing several small pro-social tasks such as remaining employed, paying restitution, or
completing treatment. The completion of several of these goals contributes to an offender’s
remaining crime free.
Besides these bodies of literature, APPA has gathered relevant information from a focus
group of probation and parole practitioners and research, and a web-based information request to
community corrections practitioners across the U.S. and Canada. Before presenting the results of
the request for information, a literature review will be presented. The literature review is not
intended to completely cover any of these substantive fields, but rather to contextualize the
current changes taking place within community corrections and to aid in developing strategies
for administrators and policymakers to address needs arising from supervising more high-risk
offenders. The conclusion to this report will incorporate organizational and criminological
theories to help organize the thinking of practitioners who embark on the development of
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policies and practices that support appropriate community corrections officer workload
allocation.
SUPERVISION GOALS: PUNISHMENT AND REHABILITATION ARE NOT
MUTUALLY EXCLUSIVE
The justice system goals of punishment and rehabilitation can effectively co-exist if
carefully managed and thoroughly understood by professionals and external stakeholders (e.g.,
the public, policymakers). In fact, many correctional services delivered under the philosophical
banner of rehabilitation are viewed by offenders as punishment. As well, many offender
accountability and justice services are viewed by external stakeholders as punishment, but they
also present robust opportunities for offender behavior change. A correctional service, strategy or
program can provide judges and releasing authorities with a range of sentencing and correctional
options, but they certainly need not be limited to cheaper ways to deliver proportionate
punishment. In the context of the foregoing examples it is relatively easy to understand how
correctional concepts that are often placed in ideological camps are in fact amenable to
coexisting in their applications across the spectrum of correctional services.
One of the major problems to articulate meaningful correctional goals is that political and
professional ideologies are used to promote certain goals and to defeat others. For example, those
who are opposed to the notion of punishment have been dismissive of anything within
corrections that hints of punishment. Opponents of punishment-based correctional strategies
strenuously argue, for instance, that public safety will not be achieved through punishment –
intermediate or otherwise. External stakeholders, some victims of crime and the general
American public – not to mention many professional insiders – are troubled by an abandonment
of punishment as a correctional goal. The disquiet experienced by those wanting to maintain a
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punitive component within corrections likely derives from the notion that justice is abrogated if
offenders do not pay some price for their law violation. Can punishment be delivered alongside
rehabilitative measures? Empirical evidence suggests that accomplishing both of these goals is
possible as punishment and rehabilitation are not necessarily mutually exclusive concepts.
The research evidence in favor of offender behavior change as the most effective strategy
to enhance public safety is impressive and voluminous (see Andrews & Dowden, 2006; Clark,
2001; Paparozzi & Lowenkamp, 2000; Taxman et al., 2004; Taxman, Douglas, & Byrne, 2003).
Professionals within corrections have not, unfortunately, been effective in demonstrating how
and why rehabilitation strategies should be matched to the goal of public safety and retribution.
This has fueled confusion, both within and outside of the profession, about what can be expected
from incapacitation and punishment strategies and what we can expect from rehabilitation
strategies for offender supervision. Regardless of whether one perceives punishment or
rehabilitation as the central goal for community corrections, it is necessary to address issues
related to officer caseload size and concomitant workload realities. Compounding these problems
is that rarely do community corrections agencies establish their own supervision conditions, but
rather many conditions are set by the judiciary, releasing authority, or other stakeholders with
input into probation and parole supervision—often bodies having little to do with the actual
supervision of offenders once released into the community.
A variety of offenders are supervised under the banner of community corrections. These
offenders range from non-violent property and drug offenders, drunk-drivers, to violent
offenders including intimate partner abusers, sex offenders, gang members, and others. It is fair
to say that a significant number of offenders under community supervision pose a significant risk
for violent criminal behavior. Supervising offenders who have a propensity to commit violent
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crime is a matter of serious consequence –frequently a matter of life and death (Rhine &
Paparozzi, 1999). Because offender supervision is a matter of serious consequence to the general
public, it is essential that offenders are classified, supervised, and provided with services that are
innovative and rooted in empirical evidence. Employing innovative strategies to supervise
offenders requires competent and committed professionals who have the time to perform the
important tasks related to classification, supervision, and service delivery to offenders under
supervision. For at least the past four decades it has been well-known to professional insiders
that probation and parole officer workloads exceed realistic potential for accomplishing the
numerous tasks required to supervise offenders. It is especially important to discuss workload
growth as something distinct from growth in caseloads because the former refers to the amount
of work required to adequately supervise each offender’s compliance with ordered conditions of
supervision, whereas the latter refers to the number of offenders supervised by each officer. A
central aspect to this report is that both of these conditions have grown simultaneously. That is,
community corrections populations’ records demonstrate that there are more offenders on
probation and parole today than in the past, with more of these offenders having increased and
more complex ordered conditions of supervision and many more have high levels of risk and
needs to be addressed, which increases the workload per offender.
The question that has been asked, but which has been inadequately addressed to date, is:
What is the ideal caseload size (see Paparozzi & Hinzman, 2005)? The matter of caseload size
cannot be addressed appropriately unless it is considered within the larger context of probation
and parole officer workload issues. A commitment to resolving officer caseload, and therefore
workload, issues carries with it a commitment to address resource allocations to community
corrections functions. Perhaps it is the funding issue that has caused community corrections
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professionals and elected policymakers to continually sidestep the need for resolution to caseload
size.
Since the mid-1960s, there have been cycles of tight and “boom” budgets with state
government in general and community corrections agencies, in particular. Notwithstanding these
fiscal cycles, virtually no policy decisions have been made with regard to the empirical evidence
when it comes to probation and parole officer workload and caseload size. It is still the case that
in professional circles there is acknowledgment that the average contact with an offender is about
five minutes and frequently what passes for offender supervision in community settings is in fact
office-based supervision where officers conduct “supervision” from their office desk.
Community corrections officers are not the only justice system practitioners dealing with
tightening budgets and growing offender populations, but given that community corrections
agencies supervise nearly three-quarters of all adults in the criminal justice system it is necessary
for policy makers and administrators to carefully consider effective means for making workload
allocations. Central to this goal, is incorporating or even educating the judiciary, releasing
authorities and policymakers regarding the impact of what Lucken (1997) referred to as the
“piling up of sanctions” in which offenders are sentenced to an complex assortment of conditions
and expectations that are difficult for them to comply with and problematic for officers to
enforce.
GROWING CASELOADS AND WORKLOAD ALLOCATIONS
How many offenders can an officer adequately supervise? Is there a precise number of
offenders that can effectively be supervised by an officer? The number of offenders an officer
can effectively supervise is function of the type of offenders being supervised by certain officers.
This is the same as saying that all offenders and officers are unique and bring different
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knowledge, skills, capacities, and competencies. Both of these groups exist across a continuum.
Some offenders have substance abuse issues, difficulty finding and keeping a job, mental health
problems, and limited education, while others do not have these problems. The compilation of
these characteristics along with other criminal history factors come together to shape an
offender’s relative risk of reoffending in the future. Many probation agencies realize the need to
consider these characteristics and have begun incorporating various scales to determine an
offender’s risks and needs to make better administrative decisions regarding workload
allocations.
Researchers, policymakers, and administrators are continually thinking of ways to
address the growth in caseloads alongside stagnant budgets (even declining in some places).
Unfortunately, attempts to manage workload in the face of inadequate funding allocations have
frequently resulted in higher caseloads. Another method is to modify risk classification scores
such that offenders are reassigned to lower risk levels of supervision. The National Institute of
Corrections (NIC) utilized the Model Case Management Systems Project to move the country in
the direction of a workload model (see Clear, 2005). This model, unfortunately, was never
officially embraced and fell to the wayside. APPA addressed this issue, in 1990, as then
President Donald Evans responded to member requests to develop caseload size standards in
which total caseload was seen as a function of case priority (high, medium, or low) and hours per
month spent on each of these types of cases (ranging from 4 hours, 2 hours, or 1 hour,
respectively).
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Supervision Caseload Approach (APPA, 1990)
Case Priority
High
Medium
Low
Hours Per Month
4 hours
2 hours
1 hour
Total Caseload
30 cases
60 cases
120 cases*
*This is based on a 120 work hours per officer each month
APPA’s initial attempt to develop caseload size standards provides a simple formula for
assigning officer caseloads and was one of the first attempts to move the field toward a workload
model. What is a workload model? This workload model is one that recognizes that offender and
jurisdictional differences (e.g., geography, automation, duties) equate into more or less officer
time per offender such that “high” priority offenders require twice the time to supervise than a
“medium” priority offender, and four fold the time required to supervise a “low” priority
offender. There is no doubt that, in retrospect, this is an overly simplistic formula for calculating
a national caseload standard. Nonetheless, the novelty of the model rests in its willingness to
move probation agencies away from a quantitative approach based solely on counting the
number of supervision contacts to a model that recognizes quantifiable factors related to
offender characteristics (emphasizing offender risk-level, case supervision plans, the nature of
contacts and how offenders respond).
There were prior attempts to the APPA (1991) report to establish caseload size standards,
most notably that by the Commission on Law Enforcement and the Administration of Justice
(1967) in which 50 offenders were believed to be an appropriate caseload size. APPA realized
that developing a definitive national caseload size number was not the best approach (also see
APRI, 2002). That is, the APPA (1991: 4) report concluded that searching “for the single magic
number for the optimal caseload size is futile” due to the diversity in local expectations for their
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community correctional systems, organizational structures, local judicial decision making, and
varying offender risks and needs.
From Caseload to Classrooms: What is the Right Number?
More recently, Bill Burrell (2006) recognized the difficulty for probation and parole
agencies looking for caseload size standards. His discussion provides an interesting parallel
between that of an officer’s caseload size and a teacher’s classroom size. It seems to be equally
hard for educators to determine a “magic number” of students per teacher as it is for justice
professionals and experts to identify an ideal caseload size per officer. There are several
similarities between these professions, which Burrell (2006) refers to as human capital intensive,
with each requiring (1) directed individual human attention to others, (2) a move away from
quantity to quality of such interaction, and (3) growing populations to service. Consider the
growth in university students as college attendance has moved away from being an opportunity
reserved mostly for the elite into organizations servicing the general public, and how this is
similar to the relatively steady growth in the justice system. Or, the need to not only focus on
how many students a teacher can “handle” to one that seeks to understand in what conditions
students make their greatest academic gains. Similarly, probation agencies are now more
concerned with what types of interactions or interventions with offenders are more likely to bring
about both long and short term behavior changes. In the final analysis, whether for teachers or
community corrections officers, the critical point to remember is that expected outcomes need to
respect the strategies which produce them. Inasmuch as workload issues are related to strategies
for producing outcomes, it is folly, if not perilous to the public’s well-being, to ignore them. In
this regard a business model is instructive (Paparozzi, 2003).
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It is intuitive to think that smaller classrooms and smaller caseloads would foster better
results (Burgess, 1996; Clear, 2005). In fact, classroom size tends to be a serious concern for
parents and children alike as they make university plans and decisions, with some preferring to
attend large universities with a high student to teacher ratio and others seek institutions in which
there are few students in classes. While there is little empirical research definitively answering
whether smaller classes correlate with better academic gains, there is little support for arguing
that smaller caseloads automatically reduce re-offending (Petersilia & Turner, 1991; Worrall,
Schram, Hays, & Newman, 2004). Burrell (2006: 4) points out that “small classes alone are not
enough.” The same is true for probation and parole caseloads, as fewer offenders on a caseload
do not necessarily produce smaller amounts of recidivism.
Instead, this is a matter of recognizing the difference between necessary and sufficient
causes. This is a well known dichotomy recognizing necessary causes as those that (when
present) interact with other factor(s) to produce a particular phenomenon or outcome, whereas
sufficient causes can operate alone to bring about a desired effect. Where does caseload size fit
in this dichotomy? “Appropriate class/caseload size is the necessary precondition,” according to
Burrell (2006: 5, italics added), “to effectiveness in these two systems.” Caseload size alone does
not determine the effectiveness of supervision, but it is a necessary (but not sufficient) basis for
producing desired outcomes. One could even think of this as a starting point for developing
effective interventions as overly large caseloads with unrealistic workload points1 can foster
ineffective officers and agencies. The issue facing community corrections is to develop a strategy
to achieve the goal of public safety in given fiscal environments, and that entails recognizing the
1
Workload points refers to many agencies that record officer performance in workload points to reflect the amount of time
required for various tasks, instead of merely counting how many offenders one is supervising. Therefore, these sorts of measures
incorporated qualitative assessments to determine an officers role by considering the kinds of tasks required to supervise highrisk offenders, for instance.
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influx of more high-risk offenders, such as sex offenders, that require more amount of time than
low-risk offenders.2
Probation on the Eleven O’clock News
There is a point at which an over burdened workload produces inefficiencies. In the
manufacturing world, this leads to fewer cars being produced and a reduction in corporate
profits, but for community corrections agencies this can lead to more attention on the eleven
o’clock news. That is, community corrections agencies, and other justice system professions, can
be characterized as “bad news businesses” in which primarily bad news or outcomes are reported
to the public. Rarely are there reports, exposes, or leads about how effective an officer has been
at ensuring that a probationer completes his or her treatment. There are few “breaking news
reports” covering a probationer’s G.E.D. graduation, but there are usually throngs of reporters
scrambling to cover the story of a probationer committing a murder or a released sex offender
victimizing someone. The Willie Horton incident serves as a reminder of this effect. Mr. Horton,
a convicted felon, was out on a parole furlough program in Massachusetts when he broke into a
women’s home, sexually assaulted and killed her. News of this incident continually ran on news
stations and other media outlets, and was a significant obstacle for the Governor of
Massachusetts and presidential candidate, Michael Dukakis, in the 1988 election (Kappeler,
Blumberg, & Potter, 2000).
While the media generated hysteria surrounding the Horton incident might not be fresh
on everyone’s mind, more recently, similar events were reported in Michigan, in 2002. The
Detroit News (Claxton, Sinclair, & Hansen, 2002) published an expose titled “Felons on
Probation Often Go Unwatched” as they describe an overburdened and understaffed probation
2
Central to the notion of evidence based practices in a correctional setting is to measure the relative risk that an offender will
reoffend during their supervision period. The higher one’s risk level usually requires officers to spend more time to supervise
such offenders.
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department in one county. This county had roughly 30,000 probationers and around 250 officers
to supervise them, an average of nearly 120 offenders per officer. In one case, an officer was
fired after a probationer was arrested for attempted murder and engaging in a shoot-out with
police. The probationer was a fugitive, missing several office visits, but he was never reported as
an absconder nor listed as a fugitive at the time of the shooting. According to the article, the
probation officer “was so overworked that she failed to get an arrest warrant for [the probationer]
when he became a fugitive last December for missing his monthly probation office appointment.
[The officer] still hadn’t done so by March 28 when he was arrested” (Claxton et al., 2002: 2).
The Detroit News reports several similar incidents. These incidents all point to the
difficulty of making workload decisions and how probation agencies can meet the community
needs by addressing offender needs and risks. The underlying issue was summarized by a
Michigan department of corrections spokesman as a problem with high caseloads related to high
staff turnover brought about by recent retirements. Again, caseload and workload issues are not a
sufficient factor for probation success, but it is a necessary force to consider for probation to be
effective. The news article goes further to document a system in which officers were overworked
to the point of trying to take paperwork home with them at night (but had to keep this a secret
because it violated union policies). One officer was released on sick leave for a stress-related
illness. In a letter to this officer’s union steward, she writes: “…I am currently actively
supervising in excess of 156 probationers and my workload units for October, 2002, were 177. I
am trying to do the work of two people and find it virtually impossible to perform all duties
assigned to me within the time frames set forth and in accordance with departmental policy and
procedure” (as quoted in The Detroit News, page 3 of the story).
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This probation department’s problems point to (1) the overwhelming nature of probation
officers’ caseloads, with (2) crucial duties being sacrificed due to staffing problems, and (3)
inadequate supervision easing offenders’ return to crime. This story is not mentioned to tarnish
any department or officers—similar conditions can be seen in other agencies across the country.
Rather, the intention here is to take a critical look at what can potentially happen when caseloads
move beyond realistic workloads (i.e., there is simply not enough time to complete all assigned
duties). This may create a situation in which agencies and officers are unable to perform all of
their job requirements.
EVIDENCE-BASED PRACTICE: LOOKING FOR EFFECTIVE MANAGEMENT
The question remains regarding optimal caseload size. Developing a caseload size
standard entails determining how many officers are needed to “appropriately” supervise
offenders in a jurisdiction. This sort of managerial issue is not a new question to probation or
other professions for that matter. How many patients can a surgeon operate on in a given day?
How many cars can a mechanic fix each week? How many haircuts can a barber complete in a
month? It does not take an expert in any of these fields to realize the answer normally is that it
depends. It depends on what type of surgery is needed, what is wrong with each car, and what
type of haircut one is looking for, as well as the skills of the surgeon, mechanic, and barber, not
to mention the supplies and resources available in the hospital, the repair shop, and the barber
shop. Finally, one must also consider the quality of the job performed not just the completion of
the tasks associated with the job. Would we accept anything less than quality medical care from
a surgeon?
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Evidence-Based Practices: From Shoveling Science to Better Offender Management
Frederick Taylor was an early twentieth-century engineer interested in finding the most
effective strategies for workers. Interestingly, he looked at improving the balance between rest
and work, in this case lifting a shovel. That is, it was desired by a manufacturer for workers to
move about 47 ½ tons of iron each day, but this was found to exhaust nearly all employees, as
most lacked the strength to keep up this pace. So, he conducted numerous “time studies” to
determine the most appropriate shovel for each particular job, with some larger than others, some
were flat tipped while others were pointed. Essentially, each job required a different type of
shovel. Consider lifting a large shovel all day long, one would make fewer passes with the shovel
as he or she would move slower. Conversely, Taylor timed workers using small shovels as they
could move much faster, but this strategy failed to produce the results he was looking for as well.
He did find that a shovel holding 21 pounds of a substance was the best size of shovel to balance
work productivity with ample rest. This research allowed Taylor to identify four principles of
scientific management:
1. Replace “rule-of-thumb” work methods with methods based on the scientific study of
work-related tasks.
2. Scientifically select, train, and develop each worker rather than allowing them to train
themselves.
3. Cooperate with workers to ensure that the scientifically developed methods are being
followed.
4. Divide work nearly equally between managers and workers, so that the managers use
scientific management principles to plan work and ensure that workers complete tasks
accordingly.
Taylor’s “science of shoveling” is mentioned because we see many in the human sciences
trying to incorporate similar methods to determine effective strategies for assigning workloads
whether in the medical profession, repair business, or cosmetic industry. So, then, what is the
most appropriate caseload size? The answer is still “it depends.” It depends on the type of
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offenders, the non-supervision tasks assigned to officers, the type of officer training, the
expectations of the judiciary/releasing authority, and many other issues that often are peculiar to
each jurisdiction. This is similar to Taylor recognizing that different shovels were needed for
different types of things to be moved, much as different types of training are required for
supervising offenders depending upon the level of risk they present for re-offending. However,
there is growing popularity in what is referred to as evidence-based practices that builds upon
Taylor-like principles to determine the most effective community corrections interventions to
reduce recidivism.
Death to Rehabilitation: Nothing Works!
Community corrections is a field designed to facilitate individual short- and long-term
behavior change. At the heart of community corrections is the realization that offenders have
made mistakes not so much because of unchangeable genetic features, but usually through
processes of learning and socialization. Offenders, for the most part, drift in and out of
criminality and deviance throughout the life course (Sykes & Matza, 1957). That offenders learn
criminal behaviors and drift between stages of more or less criminality suggests opportunities for
teaching offenders non-criminal behaviors such as remaining employed, staying sober,
developing peaceful means for conflict resolution, and other needed aspects to remain selfsufficient as they gain a “stake in conformity.” Much of this knowledge stems from
criminological research finding that older, married individuals, especially those owning a home
or at least remaining in the same residence for several years (i.e., residential stability) tend to
commit fewer new crimes, and when they are found to commit a new crime, they usually remain
in the community longer than their younger, unmarried, and residentially unstable counterparts.
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Justice researchers work with agencies to develop, implement, test, and revise programs.
The 1970’s were a time in which several changes were moving through the U.S. justice system,
in part, as a response to the 1960’s crime rate spike and shifting policy agenda that fostered
growing incarceration rates. Not only were correctional facilities beginning to serve more
prisoners, but there was also greater scrutiny placed on what was going on in prisons.
Correctional policy moved away from rehabilitative mechanisms such as vocational training,
exercise programs, mental health treatment, substance abuse education, and other re-socialization
techniques aimed at preparing inmates for reintegration. Robert Martinson’s (1974) often cited
critique of 231 correctional treatment evaluations between 1945 and 1967 is credited as being the
inspiration for calling into question many rehabilitative correctional programs, and led to the
“nothing works” movement.
His analyses suggested there was little evidence of success in educational programs for
juvenile or adult inmates and in individual or group counseling. Martinson revealed that medical
treatment applied to alter behavior, increased sentences, and intensive probation did not reduce
recidivism rates, and these mechanisms were usually more expensive than other approaches.
Policymakers and the public questioned the need for what were considered “soft on crime”
measures, and pushed for a more narrowed focus on administrative order and punishing
offenders (Feeley & Simon, 1992). There are few that would argue against a justice system
concerned with punishing offenders. Punishment, in the form of retribution and incapacitation
cannot, however, come at the expense of ignoring other justice system functions—such as
behavior change—as such an approach would create a situation in which few offenders would
have opportunities to work toward becoming self-sufficient (i.e., able to take care of themselves
and their dependents).
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Although Martinson (1974) is routinely cited as finding rehabilitation ineffective, few
policymakers paid attention to other publications in which he suggested that the problem with
correctional programs, regardless of their design, is the “life-cycle damage” they cause. The
problem with rehabilitative programs is not the construction of any particular program or service
offered. Rather, ineffectiveness was a result of disrupting people’s lives—usually young people
most in need of educational and job skills training—by placing them in prisons for long periods
of time. Incarceration, then, potentially creates the very condition it seeks to eliminate—
reoffending—by removing people from society and weakening employment and educational
opportunities, fostering criminal associations, stifling the growth of social bonds and ties to
conventional society, and dehumanizing and stigmatizing offenders. The community corrections
field, ironically, is founded on the realization of the potential for life-cycle damage due to
institutionalization, as officers individualize supervision and treatment components to most
effectively address offender risks and needs. This is a quest to find what, if anything, works, and
if something works, who do such programs work best with?
Not so Fast: Does Anything Work?
What is referred to as “what works” and became part of the evidence-based practices
literature is a reaction to Martinson’s critique that focuses on the psychology of criminal
conduct. By acknowledging the importance of offender thought patterns, researchers can work
with agencies to identify effective organizational strategies to meet offender needs to reduce risk
of reoffending. Andrews et al. (1990: 373-374, italics added) suggest that “any anticipated
rehabilitative benefits are based on the hope that offenders will learn that crime has negative
consequences, and the enhancement of cognitive and interpersonal skills (e.g., future-orientation
and perspective-taking) are dependent upon systematic modeling, reinforcement, and graduated
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practice.” This research interest signaled that all is not lost in correctional programming. Rather,
this emphasizes the need to develop conditions of supervision that seek to reduce the crime
producing elements within offenders’ lives through a balanced approach of supervision and
treatment, which gets at the uniqueness of each offender (see Aos, Miller, & Drake, 2006).
Evidence-Based Practices: Bridging the Researcher-Practitioner Divide
There is often frustration between practitioners and researchers. This tension is usually
one over language and interpretation as researchers are concerned with things such as statistical
significance, sampling frames, and random group assignment, whereas practitioners tend to be
more concerned with pragmatic issues related to fiscal capabilities, budget reviews, and other
issues related to “getting on with” supervising offenders—the reality of the job, so to speak.
Researchers may talk about probabilities and odds ratios of various outcomes while practitioners
are more concerned with whether a particular offender is completing treatment, remaining crime
free, complying with conditions of supervision and changing behaviors.
These languages need not be considered mutually exclusive and avenues for
interpretation are being developed. To bridge the gap between researchers and practitioners, the
National Institute of Corrections (NIC) has worked with numerous research teams and agencies
to develop and implement an integrated evidence-based practices model. It should be noted that
this model focuses on those evidence-based practices that reduce risk of re-offending and focus
less on some of the other important evidence-based practices that ensure such things that could
be considered more atonement related like restitution collection and community service work.
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NIC-CJI Integrated Model: Evidence-Based Practices, Organizational Development, and
Collaboration
NIC and the Crime and Justice Institute (CJI) developed an integrated model for
implementing evidence-based practices. This is a three-tiered model placing equal weight on: (1)
evidence-based practices, (2) organizational development, and (3) collaboration. Evidence-based
practices is a buzzword moving throughout many human services professions—medicine,
education, social work--as applied research findings are increasingly pointing the way to more
effective understandings of the relationship between organizational processes (how things are
done) and outcomes (what happens). The model developed by NIC and CJI claims to have the
potential to move community corrections toward practices rooted in empirically verifiable
evidence (data), not taken-for-granted assumptions of what does and does not work—reminiscent
of Taylor’s first principle of scientific management.
NIC and CJI not only incorporate scientifically generated findings through evaluation,
but they also recognize the importance of flexible leadership to adjust traditional supervision
practices to focus on programs and practices specifically targeting recidivism. It is argued that to
develop and implement effective strategies, decision makers must avoid perpetuating ineffective
strategies simply because that is the way things have been done in the past. Instead, agency
leaders and staff need to be prepared to alter, eliminate, and adopt new practices that hold
offenders accountable and maintain public safety. While accountability and public safety are
commonly mentioned as community corrections’ goals, there is little discussion of exactly what
is meant by these terms. The EBP model, however, works to define and measure these goals
empirically to create policies and practices that are realistic, relevant, and research-based
(Clawson, Bogue, & Joplin, 2005).
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Community corrections is not the only field concerned with maximizing its effectiveness
through such an approach. Pfeffer and Sutton (2006) recognize a similar trend in many large
corporations and the medical field as CEOs and hospital administrators try to deliver products
and services in the most cost-effective and efficient manner. They mention that many top CEOs
have been forced to shift away from longstanding business practices due to evidence suggesting
its ineffectiveness—measured as lost productivity and profits. Community corrections leaders
have to adopt a new operating logic based not upon what sounds good or takes the path of least
resistance; rather, decision makers must create an atmosphere that empowers employees to
collect appropriate information, objectively process that information, and make decisions based
upon the findings—never fearing change.
The third arm of the integrated implementation model recognizes the need for enhancing
“internal and external buy-in of the change process, supporting successful implementation in the
complex web of public safety agencies, service providers, and other stakeholders” (Joplin et al.,
2004). No community corrections agency operates in a social vacuum and, for this reason,
probation and parole cannot be expected to tackle community supervision of offenders alone,
especially for high-risk populations. Therefore, community corrections agencies must reach out
to other justice and nonjustice organizations so as to incorporate law enforcement, judicial
personnel, advocates, and others. Besides establishing these external communication networks,
agencies should work toward communicating and collaborating with officers inside their agency.
The integrated implementation model improves community corrections practices and
programs for several reasons. First, this model helps move the community corrections field away
from practices founded mostly on myth and performed simply because “that is how things get
done around here” to practices founded on data collection, analysis, and application of the
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findings in a practical way. Second, there is full recognition to organizational dynamics and need
for a progressive, innovative leadership style that allows for a decentralized form of decision
making, and willingness to accept evaluation findings, not as a defeat (such as did not reduce
recidivism) or victory (such as did reduce recidivism), but rather as the needed information to
discontinue, maintain, or adjust practices. Lastly, the integrated model acknowledges the need
for community corrections agencies to establish broad professional networks of justice and nonjustice organizations to participate in the supervision process.
Evidence-Based Practices: What Are We Trying to Accomplish?
NIC and CJI developed eight evidence-based principles for effective interventions.
Discussing all eight of these principles exceeds the scope of this report, but some mention of the
risk, needs, and responsivity principles provides decision makers with needed information to
make workload allocations. Before asking whether or not something works, or does not work, or
how it could work, one must first ask what is the desired function of the item in question? So,
what is community corrections’ function? What can the public and policymakers realistically
expect from community supervision? Is it public safety? Is it behavior change? It is often said
that community corrections is to protect the public. This is only partly correct as community
corrections agencies alone cannot provide a magical protective blanket. Rather, what community
corrections can do realistically is provide offenders with some level of surveillance that
motivates them to participate in pro-social activities.
Pro-social activities might include things such as substance abuse treatment, vocational
education, life skills management, and a host of other opportunities that teach offenders how to
be self-sufficient as well as making restitution for one’s crime. This goal is one in which
community corrections agencies work with other individuals and organizations to structure
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offenders’ lives. It is helpful to think of this structure as providing external controls requiring
offenders to avoid criminogenic peers and places, with these peers and places differing for
offenders. For some offenders, visiting a playground might be the precursor to their offending
behaviors, while for some (non-sex offenders) a playground might be a place of relaxation or
fun. There are numerous scenarios that could be detailed, but suffice to say that the point here is
that these criminogenic settings are individually derived. Community corrections is not a onesize fits all business, something making workload allocation decision making more challenging.
The intent for the evidence-based practices movement in community corrections is to
foster better decision making within agencies. Community corrections’ goals are focused on
diminishing each offender’s ability to re-offend and make amends for their crime. This is done
through a litany of programs and collaboration with others.
Evidence-Based Practices: Risk, Need, and Responsivity
Evidence-based practices – as prescribed by the NIC model - evaluate the ability of
programs to reduce recidivism by targeting offender risks, needs, and responsivity to various
treatments (Andrews et al., 1990).The community corrections field is working to identify the
most effective community supervision policies and practices through applied research and
evaluative reports. These research efforts assist administrators and policymakers to gain a better
perspective of what are realistic workload capacities and how best to structure officer caseloads.
The risk principle is based on research findings that validated assessment instruments are
better able to predict recidivism than subjective or clinical offender assessments (see Andrews et
al., 1990). The risk principle is related to another evidence-based practices principle of
responding to or reducing offenders’ criminogenic needs. The needs principle captures those
changing or dynamic offender risk factors such as mental health problems, substance abuse
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issues, informal networks, employment, and other individualized factors related to an offender’s
behaviors and thinking patterns (Taxman & Thanner, 2006). Whereas risk factors focus on past
behaviors related to an offender’s criminal history, the needs principle recognizes that there are
offender-level time-varying characteristics that greatly influence an offender’s predisposition to
reoffend. Consider, for example, the potential for an abusive event following the receipt of
divorce or separation papers or other potentially upsetting information, events, or processes
taking place to foster a violent outburst in the case of a chronic domestic abuser.
Taxman and Thanner (2006: 31) argue that criminogenic needs refer “to the degree to
which daily functioning is impaired and involved in criminal (antisocial) behavior.” Risk and
needs assessments are essential for administrators confronting growing caseloads as they offer an
objective measure of an offender’s likelihood to recidivate and they identify the most appropriate
interventions based upon the unique risks and needs presented by each offender. Community
corrections officers may need to adjust case plans in light of an assortment of static (risk) and
dynamic (needs) factors.
Cumulatively, the risk and needs principles identify the importance of considering
offender past behaviors alongside life course factors (e.g., age, work history) shaping their
likelihood for re-offending. The responsivity principle argues that a variety of learning styles and
approaches exist and that interventions should be assigned carefully to offenders according to
their culture, gender, and motivation levels. Evidence-based practices research suggests that
treatment must be matched to each offender, and that particular care should be taken to match
style and methods of communication with an offender’s level of readiness to change their
behavior. This means, for instance, that it may be pointless to include substance abuse treatment
interventions for offenders without a substance abuse problem. To maximize the impact of
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interventions it is important to carefully match offenders to services as the potential exists for
interventions to actually have an inverse effect from their intentions and actually increase
recidivism. Consider an example from the corporate world as Pfeffer and Sutton (2006) report
evidence that various employee ranking schemes—believed to motivate worker performance—
actually had “consequences such as lower productivity, inequity, damage to morale, and mistrust
in leadership.” Similarly, Gendreau (1996) found that poorly matching interventions with
offenders has a tendency to increase recidivism such that low-risk offenders placed in programs
alongside high-risk offenders tend to perform poorly.
The risk, needs, and responsivity principles are essential to creating a context in which
community corrections agencies are better able to identify the most effective interventions and
supervision strategies. The evidence-based practices approach replaces unfounded
organizationally embedded practices with strategies supported by scientific observation and
analysis (Joplin et al., 2004). These research findings and principles provide administrators with
something of a road for making workload allocation decisions in a constrained budgetary
environment.
It is important for policy makers, administrators, and practitioners to begin to understand
the importance of synthesizing the concepts of evidence-based practices and the continued
expansion of officer workloads. The point here is that many departments are increasing caseloads
to well over 200 offenders per officer, making it virtually impossible for offenders to receive
adequate attention and interaction from officers to have any substantial rehabilitative effect.
Besides the growth in offender to officer ratios, the current trend of stacking up sanctions on
offenders is potentially making it more difficult for offenders to meet all of these conditions and
equally as difficult for officers to enforce them. Compounding these issues is the current trend of
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concentrating on sex-offenders, the infusion of electronic monitoring technologies, and
increasing the use of probation for higher-risk offenders as well as widening the justice net to
low risk offenders. For these reasons, this report seeks to understand how agencies can work
toward getting a handle on rising workloads.
CASELOAD SIZE AND WORKLOAD ALLOCATION: RESPONSE FROM APPA
MEMBERS
This report is intended to provide probation administrators and policymakers with
valuable information to make workload allocation and funding decisions. APPA is not trying to
establish a magic number of offenders to be supervised by each officer as a caseload standard
because caseloads are a poor measure of officer output. Workload measures are a more accurate
method for distributing cases throughout any agency. APPA assists the community corrections
field to become more effective at supervising offenders and meeting the needs of victims of
crime, and sees workload allocation decisions central to any attempt to become more effective.
Caseload size is a necessary precondition of effective community supervision and meeting the
needs of victims, as are considerations of offender risks, needs, and responsivity. To gain a better
understanding of how this issue is viewed by community corrections officers, the association
circulated a non-probability, web-based information request.
Information Request: Delivery and Collection Approach
APPA sends a bi-weekly electronic news bulletin to the field. This news letter, titled CC
Headlines, is sent to approximately 1,500 individuals and agencies combined. It is imagined that
the news bulletin is forwarded to others as well (for each person who receives the newsletter, it is
believed approximately ten more people receive it through email forwarding), but there is no
systematic measurement of to what extent this happens. The bulletin is designed to provide
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information about many aspects of the community corrections field, as well as interesting crime
and justice related stories, impending legislation, project announcements, and other items of
general interest. There is space in this newsletter to include a link to a web-based information
request. Approximately one week prior to disseminating the request form, a pre-notice was
emailed to the CC Headlines mailing list. The pre-notice described the importance of the topic
and need for APPA to receive information regarding growing caseloads and workload
allocations, and the impact of high-risk offenders, namely sex offenders, on workload allocation
decisions.
It should be stressed that the nature of the APPA mailing list and possibility for
forwarding prevent establishing a sampling frame. It is impossible to get any idea of a response
rate as there is little way of knowing how many individuals actually viewed the request for
information. There is the possibility that some visitors to the APPA webpage did not see the
request for information,3 and it is equally plausible that some readers forwarded the request to
others (and maybe these recipients further forwarded the request). The point here is to highlight
the non-probabilistic nature of this request. With that said, however, the information does
provide much interesting descriptive data regarding several facets of the reality of some
community corrections departments across the country.
The pre-notice for the information request was included in CC Headlines on April 11,
2006. There was initial interest in the topic as APPA received nearly 130 responses once the
questionnaire was released in the April 25, 2006 CC Headlines.4 Then, a reminder letter was
included in the following CC Headlines (May 9, 2006), in which another 60 responses were
3
The request for information notice was placed in the center of the bulletin in such a way that it was apparent when a visitor
opened the webpage.
4
The request for information form was completed online and, once “submitted,” sent to an Excel spreadsheet, which was later
converted into a SPSS file.
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received. A final reminder was sent, on May 16, 2006, emphasizing the need for information,
and established a deadline for interested individuals to send in responses. This resulted in nearly
240 responses, and after eliminating responses due to such errors as too much missing
information, and even duplicate forms submitted electronically, the total number of responses
was 228 (for more information on Internet survey methods, see Schaefer & Dillman, 1998).
The information request was separated into three sections and kept relatively brief. The
first set of items requested information about the agency in which the respondents were
employed and some personal demographic information. The second section asked more pointed
questions about caseload and workload allocation decision making within the agency in which
the respondent is working. Finally, the third section included items on how agencies handle
rising caseloads of high-risk offenders, especially sex offenders.
Information Request: Describing the Respondents
This information request was interested in gathering baseline data about current
community corrections practices. As table 1 reveals, respondents were predominantly affiliated
with probation departments, accounting for 56 percent (n = 129) of all respondents. Nearly onethird (n = 70) of respondents indicated working in combined agencies serving probation and
parole functions, five percent (n = 12) were in parole agencies, and seven percent (n = 17)
worked in an “other” type of agency. These descriptive items revealed that the bulk of
respondents worked in rather large jurisdictions with nearly half of respondents (n = 110) serving
jurisdictions of 300,000 or more. Twenty-nine percent of respondents (n = 68) work in
jurisdictions with between 75,000 and 300,000 residents. Other respondents indicated serving
smaller jurisdictions with 10 percent (n = 24) serving populations between 30,000 and 75,000,
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and 12 percent of respondents (n = 26) work in jurisdictions with less than 10,000 to 30,000
people.
There was little difference in geographic regions in which respondents were employed. In
fact, there is a nearly symmetrical distribution of respondents in rural (n = 60, 26 percent),
suburban (n = 61, 27 percent), urban (n = 62, 27 percent), and “other” jurisdictions (n = 44, 19
percent). The over-representation of respondents serving larger jurisdictions could be related to
several factors such as the web-based nature of the information request as agencies in smaller
jurisdictions may lack computer resources.
The number of full-time officers in the agency in which the respondent worked revealed
that most agencies were relatively small. Forty percent (n = 91) of respondents worked in
agencies with 25 or fewer full-time officers, 16 percent (n = 36) worked in agencies with
between 26 and 50 officers, and 14 percent (n = 31) of respondents worked in agencies with
between 51 and 100 officers. Nearly a quarter of respondents worked in agencies with a large
number of full-time officers, with 19 percent (n = 43) of respondents indicating that their
department has more than 200 officers and 8 percent (n = 19) served in departments with
between 101 and 200 full-time officers (see table 1).
Criminological literature suggests that community supervision has changed recently to
accommodate the growth of high-risk offenders. Some community corrections experts point to
the decreasing and stagnating funding environment for community corrections, preventing many
agencies from hiring new personnel, and some actually needing to decrease their staff.
Respondents were asked if there had been a reduction in full-time community corrections
officers in their agency as a direct result of budgetary concerns within the past two years. Nearly
one-fifth of respondents (n = 43, 19 percent) answered in the affirmative to this question. A
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follow-up item was included to get an idea of approximately how many officers agencies needed
to eliminate. Of those respondents indicating a budgetary need to reduce full-time officers in
their department, there was a range of between 1 and 55 officers reduced, an average of nine
officers reduced.
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Table1: Descriptive Agency Information
Number
Percent
Agency Type
Probation
129
56
Parole
12
5
Combined
70
31
Other
17
7
Jurisdiction Size
<10k
2
1
10-30
24
11
30-50k
11
5
50-75k
13
5
75-150k
35
15
150-300k
33
14
>300k
110
48
Jurisdiction Type
Rural
60
26
Suburban
61
27
Urban
62
27
Other
44
19
# Full-Time Officers
1-25
91
40
26-50
36
16
51-100
31
14
101-200
19
8
201+
43
19
N = 220
Agency shift
Decreased
43
19
# Officers Reduced
Maximum
55
Minimum
1
Mean
9
Unionization
Yes
133
58
No
95
42
Years Experience
1-5
26
11
6-10
47
21
11-20
67
29
20+
89
39
Mean Years = 17.68
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Again, this information request is a non-probability sample (i.e., web-based convenience
sample), and it is not suggested that these findings can be generalized to all of community
corrections. Nonetheless, this does provide much needed exploratory data supporting the
contention that community corrections agencies face serious fiscal concerns.
There is no doubt that organizational based surveys contain some disadvantages such as
inexperienced or unknowledgeable respondents. The respondents indicated an average of nearly
18 years of community corrections experience, and 68 percent (n = 156) have between eleven
and more than twenty years of experience. In addition, 44 percent (n = 85) of respondents
indicated being a chief, director, or deputy chief or director. The lengthy years of experience and
that nearly half of respondents were in a top leadership position within their agency lends
credibility to the information provided.
Community Corrections: What are Supervision Goals?
There is much discussion regarding the purpose or goal of community supervision. This
debate usually provides a dichotomy between punishment and rehabilitation, with some sideline
mention of morale building and issues of safety. Respondents were asked to rank each of seven
possible goals of supervision with a score of one being the least important and ten being the most
important. Community safety had the highest mean score (8.75) of the seven supervision goals,
67 percent (n = 154) of respondents found this highly important and only seven percent (n = 16)
selected this as having little importance. Related to community safety, is the goal of victim
protection, which was also highly rated by respondents with a mean score of 8.05, and 38 percent
(n = 86) and 40 percent (n = 92) ranking this item as either important or highly important,
respectively.
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Respondents placed nearly equal significance on offender monitoring (mean score =
7.97), therapy and rehabilitation (mean score = 7.89), and holding offenders accountable (mean
score = 7.71). These three items, to a certain extent, get at a common debate about supervision as
a way to punish (law enforcement model) or a way to rehabilitate (social worker model). Rather,
it may be the case that these goals are not mutually exclusive, as much as two-sides to the same
coin--behavior change. That is, one must monitor offenders’ compliance with supervision
conditions, hold them responsible when (or if) offenders go astray of these conditions—actually
punishing--with the intentions of ensuring that offenders are receiving various treatments and
working towards behavior change. This need for working toward behavior change is evident in
respondents’ high rating (n = 7.07) for reintegration with the community. Although respondents
envision that safety, punishment, and rehabilitation are highly valued supervision goals, there is
less emphasis placed on the moral reformation of offenders, with a mean score of 6.17.
This tension between rehabilitation, punishment (retribution?), and victim and
community safety are further elaborated by respondents in open-ended items. One respondent
states (italics added) that “community safety, victim safety, and offender accountability have
become focus points…but the resources to accomplish these changes is an ongoing process of
adaptation to the demands placed upon supervision.” This statement captures the interaction of
these goals as well as the officer’s strain fostered by a context of little resources and bloated
workloads. A different respondent summarized the view in his or her agency as “We view
ourselves as the front line between high-risk offenders and the community we live in.” And yet,
another respondent claimed that their department “has become more punitive, acting as police,
rather than rehabilitative.” These quotes indicate a sense of moving toward community safety
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and crime reduction as central organizational goals, and a need to consider more fully the fiscal
needs emerging from steering community corrections’ function in such a way.
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Table 2: Ranking Supervision Goals
Number
Character or Moral Reformation
Least Importance (1-3)
32
Somewhat Important (4-6)
89
Important (7-9)
87
Most Important (10)
20
Mean Score = 6.17
Therapy and Rehabilitation
Least Importance (1-3)
7
Somewhat Important (4-6)
34
Important (7-9)
142
Most Important (10)
46
Mean Score = 7.89
Reintegration with Community
Least Importance (1-3)
18
Somewhat Important (4-6)
63
Important (7-9)
108
Most Important (10)
40
Mean Score = 7.07
Offender Monitoring
Least Importance (1-3)
9
Somewhat Important (4-6)
36
Important (7-9)
114
Most Important (10)
70
Mean Score = 7.97
Holding Offenders Accountable (punishment)
Least Importance (1-3)
11
Somewhat Important (4-6)
50
Important (7-9)
106
Most Important (10)
61
Mean Score = 7.71
Victim Protection
Least Importance (1-3)
19
Somewhat Important (4-6)
30
Important (7-9)
92
Most Important (10)
86
Mean Score = 8.05
Community Safety
Least Importance (1-3)
16
Somewhat Important (4-6)
16
Important (7-9)
40
Most Important (10)
154
Mean Score = 8.75
American Probation & Parole Association
Percent
14
39
38
9
3
15
62
20
8
28
47
18
4
16
50
31
5
22
46
27
8
13
40
38
7
7
18
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Workload vs. Caseload: Decision making avenues for Community Corrections
This report emphasizes a concern with how agencies make caseload and workload
allocation decisions. The use of periodic workload reports is highly prevalent in the agencies in
which the respondents work, with 70 percent (n = 160) answering in the affirmative. There is
concern with the different levels of risk each offender possesses, with 60 percent (n = 137) of
respondents indicating their departments recognize such differences when making workload
allocation decisions. This suggests that agencies apply different time values based upon offender
risk scores (such that offenders deemed more likely to re-offend ostensibly receive more
attention and time). While agencies realize the value in conducting workload studies and
workload units are connected to risk scores, only 24 percent (n = 54) of the respondents utilized
a workload model, whereas 58 percent (n = 133) use a caseload model.
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Table 3: Workload and Caseload Allocation
Number
Percent
Period workload reports
Yes
160
70
No
68
30
Workload Units related to Risk scores
Yes
137
60
No
91
40
Work Assigned
Workload Model
54
24
Caseload Model
133
58
Other Model
39
17
Caseload
Much too Small
1
.5
Slightly too Small
0
0
About Correct Size
64
28
Slightly too Large
91
40
Much too Large
63
28
Workload
Much too Small
3
1
Slightly too Small
2
1
About Correct Size
50
22
Slightly too Large
83
36
Much too Large
82
36
Number offenders on Caseload
Mean Size =
106 offenders
Adequate supervision of Caseload
Mean Size =
77 offenders
Respondents were asked to comment on their current caseload and workload to get a
better idea of how they view the amount of work they perform. As indicated in table 3, these
items asked respondents to rate their caseload size between much too small and much too large.
Only one respondent felt that his or her caseload was too small and 28 percent (n = 64) of
respondents found their caseload to be about the correct size. On the other hand, the majority of
respondents indicated their caseloads were either slightly too large (40 percent, n = 91) or much
too large (28 percent, n = 63). In a similar item, respondents were asked to comment on their
workload, with five respondents (2 percent) indicating their workloads were too small and 22
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percent (n = 50) found their workloads about the correct size. Following the trend with the
findings for caseload size, slightly over 70 percent of respondents indicated their workloads were
either slightly too large or much too large.
Respondents were asked to indicate the approximate average number of offenders on a
general caseload in their agency. This question was worded as such to allow administrators that
may not supervise a caseload of offenders to provide general information about the caseload size
in his or her agency. The mean number of offenders on a caseload was 106 offenders. Another
item asked respondents to provide their idea of the number of offenders that could be adequately
supervised. Respondents, on average, felt that 77 offenders was the correct number of offenders
that could be adequately supervised.
These responses, overwhelmingly, point to a situation in which respondents feel as
though their workloads exceed most realistic expectations. In fact, the approximate average of
general caseloads is about 30 percent larger than respondents’ suggested ideal caseload size.5
More clarity can be gained from respondents’ open-ended answers in which they commented
about caseload size. One respondent indicated that in his or her agency “caseloads have
doubled…Our ability to meet the needs of these offenders has been difficult with very limited
community resources, limited budgets, and a lack of support from the top and the bench.” This
respondent’s frustration is an example of how community corrections agencies and officers are
expected to supervise more offenders, with fewer resources, and the potential for employee strain
and burn-out, similar to the situation described by the Detroit News.
Another respondent simply stated that “More officers are needed to provide the level of
expectations that each offender should receive.” Funding issues are tied to most decisions made
5
It is reasonable to suspect that, when asked confidentially, many workers would claim to be over worked and under
funded. Bolstering this data, however, is that 44 percent of respondents were high level administrators, and that there
is much discussion of such a trend in criminological literature.
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by organizations—whether community corrections or for profit industries—and they determine
the possibility of such things as trainings, equipment purchases, and personnel hires. One
respondent commented on the relationship between these items and how they come together to
shape the ability to offer effective community interventions.
“Training is minimal and equipment is sparse. [STATE NAME] has adopted a resource brokerage
type of supervision. On the occasions when [officers] do venture out into the field to check up on
probationers, [officers] are too poorly equipped and trained to do much more than a quick drive
by of residence. Unfortunately, [STATE NAME] has disregarded officer safety even after some
recent high profile assaults on probation officers who attempted home visits. Thus, furthering the
belief that probation supervision is best conducted from the office.”
Obviously, this respondent feels strongly about the potential ramifications for under-funding
probation training and ensuring that officers have the appropriate equipment. However, this
provides little in the way of what administrators and policymakers should be doing to change this
situation, but another respondent did suggest that a “a resolution would be caseload caps, more
equipment, and streamlining several processes.” No doubt such suggestions come easily when
merely placed on paper, but are much more difficult to implement. Nevertheless, these
respondents’ comments identify a certain uneasiness regarding the growth in caseloads of more
high-risk offenders and the (fiscal) impact this has on most organizational operations. It could
also be that the justice system is beginning to sentence more offenders to probation that, in the
past, would not have received any sanction. Simply, probation has become a viable sanctioning
option for judges as well as legislatures believing probation an appropriate sanction for offenses
(and offenders) that would have received a lesser or no sanction at all in previous times.
Determining Supervision Conditions
What information is used in community corrections agencies to determine appropriate
workloads? A similar question was posed to respondents to gain a better idea of how risk
assessments, criminal history, offense type, court ordered conditions, and needs assessments
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shape workload allocations. These items were arranged in a ten point scale in which “one”
indicates little importance and “10” indicates the highest level of importance for an item. Table 4
reveals optimistic findings for the community corrections field, as concepts central to the
evidence-based practices approach are represented in these responses. That is, risk assessment
received the highest mean score (7.93, n = 173), with slightly more than three-quarters of
respondents finding this important or highly important. It is often said that community
corrections operates at the behest of the judiciary, and respondents supported that argument as
the mean score was 7.83. This indicates that court designated conditions are central to shaping
the community supervision process, and might to some extent leave probation and parole
agencies with their hands tied. That non-correctional practitioners are often responsible for
setting supervision conditions is a significant issue that should not be understated. In fact, this
serves as the crux of the argument confronted in this report. There is a greater plausibility that
conditions established with little input from community corrections experts (namely officers)
runs the risk of sanction stacking and reducing officer effectiveness and diminishing offender
potentials at changing their behavior.
Two other evidence-based practices concepts, criminal history (static risk factors) and
needs assessment, received mean scores of 7.37 and 7.24, respectively. The idea of offense type
uniformity received a lower mean score of 6.68. When looking at these findings cumulatively, it
appears that agencies are moving away from making decisions based merely upon an offenders
current offense, but instead are embracing a dichotomous approach toward workload allocation.
That is, on the one hand, agencies are moving toward implementing evidence-based practices
that have been found to reduce one’s risk of re-offending by more fully incorporating risk and
needs assessments, and considering the totality of an offender by looking at criminal history and
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other individual factors shaping offender behavior. On the other hand, respondents indicated that
often they are limited in their ability to establish supervision conditions, but instead conditions
are established through the court, releasing authority, and/or they are stipulated by state statutes.
Table 4: Determining Supervision Levels
Risk Assessment
Least Importance (1-3)
Somewhat Important (4-6)
Important (7-9)
Highly Important (10)
Mean Score = 7.93
Criminal History
Least Importance (1-3)
Somewhat Important (4-6)
Important (7-9)
Highly Important (10)
Mean Score = 7.37
Offense Type Uniformity
Least Importance (1-3)
Somewhat Important (4-6)
Important (7-9)
Highly Important (10)
Mean Score = 6.68
Court Designed Conditions
Least Importance (1-3)
Somewhat Important (4-6)
Important (7-9)
Highly Important (10)
Mean Score = 7.83
Needs Assessment
Least Importance (1-3)
Somewhat Important (4-6)
Important (7-9)
Highly Important (10)
Mean Score = 7.24
Number
Percent
23
24
76
97
10
11
33
43
25
35
115
46
11
15
50
20
27
56
100
33
12
25
44
15
18
33
89
81
8
15
39
36
22
43
94
59
10
19
41
26
Contextualizing the above answers, one respondent bluntly stated that “we are trying to do
supervision that works. We believe in the evidence based practices approach, but carrying them
out can be difficult.” Another respondent mentioned that “we are in the process of instituting
evidence-based practices and redistributing caseloads to focus more resources on higher risk
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offenders and better target our interventions.” These respondents make very important points to
consider. They focus on the need for developing effective strategies to intervene in offenders’
lives, which is not easy. Indeed, it can be “difficult” to say the least. One respondent emphasized
further the movement in community corrections to evidence-based practices decision making
when he or she commented that “recent implementations of new assessment tools, with
incorporation of motivational interviewing, cognitive restructuring, and case planning has
emphasized targeting high-risk offenders.” The point here is that if evidence-based practices that
reduce risk are going to amount to more than another catch phrase, then, appropriate funding and
personnel decisions are necessary preconditions. It seems that community corrections agencies,
at least the respondents to this information request, are seriously incorporating the notions
advanced in the literature pertaining to risk reduction.
Community Corrections Practices: How long does that take?
The information request included an item asking respondents to provide approximate
times that it takes them to complete various tasks related to their job performance. These were
constructed to allow respondents to provide the time it takes to complete such tasks in hours each
month. Table 5 provides a list with their times provided by respondents. Interestingly, it appears
that respondents spend most of their time taking care off administrative tasks (36 hours),6 as it
accounts for nearly a fourth of an officer’s time based upon a 120 hour work month. A somewhat
distant second was conducting home visits (20 hours), and motivational interviewing receives
about 18 hours each month by respondents. A few tasks clustered between 10 and 14 hours per
month, collateral contacts (10 hours), court appearances (13 hours), processing technical
violations, and completing pre-sentence investigations. Again, these findings cannot be
6
There is no way to determine what specific tasks respondents would categorize as “administrative” as follow-up questions were
not asked nor were such tasks included.
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generalized to the entire population of community corrections practitioners, but they nevertheless
provide a much needed insight into how respondents spend their work time each month.
Table 5: Average Hours Spent on Officer Tasks in One Month
Hours
Conducting Home Visits
20
Verifying collateral contacts
10
Receiving training
4
Performing administrative tasks
36
Drug tests
6
Motivational interviewing
18
Verifying employment
5
Court appearances
13
Substitute coverage
8
Inter- or intra-state transfer (in)
3
Inter- or intra-state transfer (out)
3
PSI
14
Processing Technical Violations
13
Sex offenders and other high-risk Categories
Recently there has been more attention given to supervising sex and other high-risk
offenders by the public, the media, and policymakers. The information request asked respondents
if their department has “…specific policies, programs, and/or procedures targeting sex offenders
and other high-risk offenders.” High-risk offenders are a jurisdictionally defined category and
the questionnaire did not offer respondent guidance on what was meant by high-risk. This term
may refer to the probability of an offender to commit a new crime or technical violation, or could
refer to the probability of an offender being rearrested or revoked and sent to jail or prison. There
is no doubt that high-risk offender is a fluid concept, and the questionnaire item meant to find in
a general sense whether or not agencies are developing specific practices to supervise sex
offenders and other high risk offenders. This allows each respondent to answer the question in a
jurisdictionally specific way related to high-risk offender initiatives, not based on any global
perception of high-risk offender.
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High risk offenders, for example, take more time to supervise than other sorts of
offenders given their need for treatment services, electronic monitoring, polygraphs, etc. as well
receiving much more public scrutiny. It was revealed that 89 percent (n = 195) of the
respondents indicated their department having specific policies, programs, and/or procedures
targeting sex offenders and other high-risk offenders. These policies were implemented between
1971 and 2006 (see graph 1). Interesting about graph 1 is considering the concentration of such
policies beginning in 1990, with 85 (n = 127) percent7 of respondents with policies targeting
high-risk offender types implementing them between 1990 and 2006. This sixteen year trend
differs from the previous 18 year period between 1971 and 1989 in which only 22 high-risk
programs (15 percent) were established.
7
These figures are calculated on a reduced sample (n = 149) due to missing data. Forty-six respondents with high-risk policies
did not provide information about the year these programs began. This may not be the most robust of data to confirm or deny any
sort of policy trend, but even if one were to suggest that the 46 missing cases were instituted prior to 1990, this later period
spanning between 1990 and 2006 would still account for 65 percent of all implementation periods.
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Graph 1: Year High-Risk Offender Policies Implemented
12
10
Percent
8
6
4
2
0
197 197 197 197 198 198 198 198 198 198 198 198 199 199 199 199 199 199 199 199 199 200 200 200 200 200 200 200
1
6
7
8
0
3
4
5
6
7
8
9
0
2
3
4
5
6
7
8
9
0
1
2
3
4
5
6
Year
Eighty-four percent (n = 164) of agencies with sex offender policies have specific
individuals responsible for overseeing such initiatives. One respondent stated that, over the past
10 years, his or her agency’s number of high-risk officers has grown from 10 to 50 officers.
These positions usually are equipped with special tools, additional training, and smaller
caseloads. Additional regular training is central to these specialized positions, but seemed to
have less support among this group of respondents with only 32 percent (n = 69) requiring
additional annual training.
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Table 6: Sex Offenders and High-Risk Supervision
Number
Percent
Agencies with Sex and Other High-Risk Offender Specific Policies
Yes
195
89
No
24
11
Assigned Specific Officers to oversee High-Risk
Yes
163
84
No
32
16
High-Risk activities performed or contracted
Polygraph
117
60
Hired New Personnel
44
23
Penile Plethysmograph
31
16
GPS or other EM
123
63
Mandatory Treatment
177
91
Other
45
23
High-Risk Initiative Outcomes
Increased Workload
84
49
Workloads Remained Same
43
25
Workloads Decreased
24
14
Other
5
3
None
17
10
Additional Training for Sex Offender Supervision
Yes
59
32
No
128
68
How Many Additional Hours of Training Required
Minimum
4 hours
Maximum
50 hours
Mean
27 hours
Shift to Overall Mission in response to High-Risk
Yes
69
32
No
145
68
Has Legislation mandated electronic monitoring for SO
Yes
29
15
No
162
85
The information request also included items asking about practices that might be part of a
sex offender supervision case plan of those respondents indicating having high-risk initiatives.
Nearly all respondents (91 percent, n = 177) indicated having mandatory treatment for sex
offenders, 63 percent (n = 123) use GPS or other electronic monitoring tools with such offenders,
and 60 percent (n = 117) either perform or contract for polygraph. Interestingly, 23 percent (n =
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44) of respondents indicated new personnel hires to supervise the growing numbers of sex
offenders. “Our department,” according to one respondent, “has more specialized and high-risk
officers and casebooks than basic or general casebooks.” They go on to state that “this has
become a trend.”
This data is not intended to verify or deny the existence of any trend. In fact, respondents
were asked if they believe their agency altered its central mission, goal, or purpose in response to
high risk offenders. Only 32 percent (n = 69) affirmatively answered that such a shift has taken
place. Regardless of the existence of a verifiable trend toward high-risk offenders overall, it was
found that, among agencies with high-risk initiatives, 49 percent (n = 84) found their workload
increased, one-fourth (n = 43) of respondents found workloads to remain the same, and 14
percent (n = 24) actually found a reduction in workloads as a result of their departments
emphasis on high-risk offenders. It is logical to assume that creating specialized high-risk
programs, in which offenders have more criminogenic needs than general offender populations
there are increased work responsibilities. Consider, for example, one respondent’s comment:
“The proliferation and use of GPS with sex offenders has significantly increased our workloads
and thus has altered our resource allocations.”
COMMUNITY CORRECTIONS: A CHANGING ORGANIZATION
Policymakers realize the importance of community supervision as more offenders
continue to receive such sentences (Glaze & Bonczar, 2006). Unfortunately, additional funding
for these services has not kept pace with offender growth and increased officer workload. In this
environment of more offenders with more conditions and stagnating (or decreasing) budgets,
community corrections officers are forced to do more with less funding (Petersilia, 2003). This
may result in bloated caseloads and impossible workloads for officers trying to supervise all
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offenders according to jurisdictional standards. It should be noted that maintaining realistic
workloads is a sufficient condition to make community corrections effective at accomplishing
justice system goals (Burrell, 2006). This is not to say that the community corrections field is the
only or most important area of justice policy, but instead should highlight the need for greater
justice subsystem interaction and collaboration.
Collaboration among the various branches of the justice system is essential. In reality,
these separate justice subsystems are tightly interrelated. Obviously, there are separate
organizations in charge of specific components of providing public safety and order (i.e., formal
social control), and the community corrections field is only one of many subsystems constituting
the loosely connected nature of the justice system (e.g., law enforcement, judiciary). What does
it mean to be loosely connected? This is meant to identify the interdependence and “cooperation
at a distance” that exists between the legislature, judiciary, law enforcement, and institutional
and community corrections. Consider that community corrections is on the receiving end of
many justice system actions including identification of a crime, an arrest, a judge’s orders,
possibly jail or prison, and then community supervision. Because of this, community corrections
agencies do not possess the same amount of discretion that exists for police officers making
arrest decisions or prosecutors making charging decisions. Community corrections agencies do
not have the ability to control their front door (number of offenders placed on supervision) and
often lack control over the back door (when offenders can be released from supervision) as well.
This lack of control and discretion contributes to some common misperceptions about
community corrections not punishing offenders enough.
Community based sanctions are often perceived as soft on crime or allowing offenders to
go free (see Langan, 1994). This public image creates a situation in which community
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corrections administrators are potentially constrained by a political and public environment in
which more punitive mechanisms are sought. This “soft on crime” image, however, is not the
whole story. In fact, Petersilia (2003) reported that offenders routinely indicated that probation
and parole are more punitive than prison or jail time. What accounts for this paradox? Why is it
that offenders realize the seriousness of a community sentence, while the public perceives such
sentences as allowing an offender “to get away with it”? It may be that those individuals actually
experiencing supervision conditions feel the constrictive nature of community supervision and
that the general public, lacking such experiences, are unaware of the reality of life under
supervision—or as it is commonly known, “being on paper.” Despite this misperception,
community corrections has the unique ability to work from a principle of normalcy by providing
varying amounts of surveillance and intervention, while allowing an offender to continue with
“normal” (i.e., compliant, non-criminal) behaviors and avoid the negative effects of incarceration
that include being separated from family and support networks, unemployment, and stigma.
Community corrections agencies can balance the goals of rehabilitation and punishment
with an integrated approach of surveillance, treatment, and accountability. If the community
corrections field is going to identify overall organizational goals or, as Paparozzi mentioned,
“owning outcomes,” then it seems evident and logical that stakeholders want public safety
delivered judiciously, efficiently, and accomplishing more than merely punishing offenders.
These goals cannot be reached without developing an overarching principle of program
development rooted in robust evidence of effectiveness, costs, and the feasibility to be
implemented in similar jurisdictions.
Despite that the bulk of adult offenders under criminal justice control are supervised by a
community corrections officer, there has only recently developed a body of empirical research
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that identifies the most effective conditions and programs for community corrections (Andrews
et al., 1990; Aos et al., 2006; Clear & Dammer, 2003; Gendreau et al., 1996; Petersilia, 2003;
Taxman et al., 2004). Often probation and parole officers have little input in determining
supervision conditions as they are determined by the judiciary, releasing authority, or legislature.
These decision making bodies may not fully understand the realities of supervision, or be as
versed in issues related to offender behavior and attitudes, treatment potentials, and the time
issues related to enforcing conditions, and may even be under political pressure to quickly accept
certain programs or policies.
For these reasons, the justice system would do well to consider input at the sentencing
and release phase from community corrections officers through the use of assessment or presentence/pre-release investigations. The growth in caseloads has been compounded by the
simultaneous rise in conditions of supervision that might not be realistic, relevant, or supported
by research. Carl Wicklund (2004: 6) points out how commonly judges impose conditions, for
instance, on longtime alcohol or drug abusers to remain abstinent. Although this condition, upon
first glance, appears logical, it nevertheless neglects to consider the reality that part of the
recovery process includes relapse by using alcohol or drugs. A more realistic condition would be
to enforce treatment completion and work toward abstinence. Similarly, drug testing has become
a common condition imposed by the judiciary that might have little to do with an offender’s
lifestyle, but nonetheless requires officer time to conduct, monitor and/or respond to alcohol and
drug testing.
There are numerous conditions applied to an offender’s community sentence. In some
jurisdictions conditions are determined by offense type, judicial discretion, statute, or risk
assessment. Why are certain conditions of supervision mandated? Should conditions simply
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punish an offender, or should conditions assist offenders in the reintegration process? Often
conditions are passed with little empirical guidance regarding their ability to accomplish justice
system goals such as the recent spate of laws against sex offenders that range, on the one hand,
from the potentially effective to, on the other hand, the potentially impossible (Robinson, 2003).
It appears that the most effective approach to community supervision recognizes the
individualized nature of conditions to improve the reintegration process (see Andrews et al.,
1990; Aos et al., 2006). Well designed conditions of supervision shape the reintegration process
by providing offenders with the needed resources and rules of life on community supervision.
Resources refer to the physical things offenders need such as treatment, employment, and
education. These are resources in that they provide offenders with necessary elements of
remaining compliant and working toward behavior change. Conditions also provide rules of
appropriate behavior as they serve to structure the everyday movements of an offender—they are
the rules of the game of life for an offender, so to speak. They let offenders know what sorts of
behaviors are prohibited, allowed, and required such as curfews, alcohol abstinence, and
avoiding certain geographic areas. Rules also establish the consequences or response from the
justice system as offenders are informed of behavioral expectations, and when these expectations
are satisfied a positive consequence (e.g., verbal or written praise, alteration in supervision)
occurs. On the other hand, when offender behavioral expectations are violated, officers must
consistently attach these behaviors with a negative outcome (e.g., increased surveillance) for the
offender. The specific rules mandated and the resources offered should be determined based on a
risk and needs assessment and officer knowledge to identify the specific conditions most
appropriate for each individual.
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When viewing conditions of supervision as resources and rules, it becomes clear that
conditions should not be mandated with little consideration of the areas of an offender’s life that
increase his or her chances of failing on supervision. What might not be obvious, upon first
glance, is that when conditions are not realistic, relevant, and based on research, community
corrections agencies become extremely inefficient, and end up “piling on sanctions” (Lucken,
1997). Consider our chronic substance abuser mentioned above, this is someone that has been
consuming large quantities of alcohol and/or illegal drugs for quite possibly a long period of
time. Individuals with such addictions have become accustomed to using alcohol and/or illegal
drugs to handle everyday stress, to escape reality, to have fun, or for an assortment of other
reasons in an uncontrollable fashion. Regardless of why such individuals continue to overindulge in alcohol or use illegal drugs, it should be evident that these behaviors are ingrained into
the everyday practices of an individual (which is a manifestation of their thought patterns). These
entrenched behavior patterns are not going to switch overnight, but rather community corrections
should look for incremental changes in offenders’ behavior. Would probation be effective with a
chronic drunk driver, if it were to re-shape this person’s driving decisions only? That is, the
offender may still drink, he or she may continue to drink too much, but he or she does not drive
once they’ve been drinking.
It makes little sense to require multiple conditions of supervision that do not improve the
effectiveness of community corrections. Think of how an officer’s time could have been used if
he or she was not administering dozens of alcohol and drug tests each week, then making
decisions of whether to violate someone for failure of a urinalysis, and finally going through the
bureaucratic and legal procedures to complete a violation. These activities occupy officer time
and energy, and the more time spent enforcing sanctions that are not realistic, relevant, or
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supported by research is time that is lost for accomplishing other tasks. This is not to suggest that
alcohol abstinence or drug testing are not effective strategies, there are times that it is exactly
what is needed, but there are also other times when such conditions are not realistic to an
offender’s life or their crime. Not only can conditions have unintended negative effects on
offenders, but they can also place officers in a complicated situation in which enforcing such
conditions is not a realistic request.
What is hopefully realized from this discussion is that probation and parole can be
effective. However, more research is needed to understand the organizational structure, function,
and potential for outcomes. This need for more organizational research is becoming increasingly
more important as many states are placing a large burden on the community corrections field to
supervise more offenders, especially several categories of high-risk offenders, namely sex
offenders. Regardless of one’s level of support or opposition for recent sex offender supervision
legislation, there is the potential for unanticipated consequences stemming from such legislation
(DeMichele, Payne, & Buttons, forthcoming).
Consider recent requirements in some states mandating life-time global-positioning
satellite (GPS) tracking for certain sex offenders, such laws sound logical and are passed with the
best of intentions. However, there is little research suggesting that sex offenders are less likely to
victimize someone whether or not they are on GPS. This is not because the bulk of sex offenders
are known to commit new sex crimes, but rather quite the opposite, as only a small percentage of
sex offenders are believed to commit a new crime or sex crime (see Hanson & Bussiere, 1998;
Langan, Schmitt, & Durose, 2003; Sample & Bray, 2003). This should not be taken as
suggesting that sex offenders should not be punished, supervised closely, and held accountable
for all inappropriate behavior. Instead, it is important to consider the cost and effectiveness of
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lifetime GPS, the amount of officer time it will take to do routine aspects such as finding a
vendor, developing and completing a contract, selecting, ordering, and receiving the equipment,
training officers on how to use the equipment, including reading printouts, simple maintenance,
and cleaning. There is little knowledge or consideration of the costs and consequences of these
and other related everyday practices that probation and parole officers complete each day.
The intention of this report is to move community corrections policy makers and
stakeholders closer to determining workload standards. It is difficult to determine appropriate
levels of workload at the national level. However, it is clear that the courts and releasing
authorities and community corrections agencies need to work in tandem to meet the needs of the
community, victims, and offenders, and more research is needed to understand probation and
parole practices across the country. Recall that the community corrections field is reliant upon
other branches of the justice system and there needs to be greater communication between the
legislature, judiciary, releasing authorities, and community corrections agencies.
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correctional treatment work? A clinically relevant and psychologically informed meta-analysis.
Criminology, 28(3), 369-404.
Aos, S., Miller, M., & Drake, E. (2006). Evidence-based adult corrections programs: What
works and what does not. Olympia, WA: Washington State Institute for Public Policy.
APPA. (1991). Caseload standards. Perspectives, Summer. Available at: http://www.appanet.org/about%20appa/caseload.htm.
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Burgess, T. (1996). Planning the academic’s workload: Different approaches to allocating work
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Burrell, W. (2006). Caseload standards for probation and parole. American Probation & Parole
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Clark, M. (2001).Influencing positive behavior change: Increasing the therapeutic approach of
juvenile courts. Federal Probation, 65(1): 18-27.
Clawson, E., Bogue, B., & Joplin, L. (2005). Implementing evidence-based practices in
corrections: Using an integrated model. Boston, MA: Crime and Justice Institute.
Claxton, M., Sinclair, N., & Hanson, R. (2002). Felons on probation often go unwatched. Detroit
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Clear, T. (2005). Places not cases? Re-thinking the probation focus. The Howard Journal, 44(2):
172-184.
Clear, T. & Dammer, H. (2003). The offender in the community, second edition. Belmont, CA:
Wadsworth/Thomson Learning.
DeMichele, M., Payne, B., & Buttons, D. (forthcoming). Electronic monitoring of sex offenders:
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Feeley, M. & Simon, J. (1992). The new penology: notes on the emerging strategy of corrections
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Gendreau, P., Little, T., & Goggin, C. (1996). A meta-analysis of the predictors of adult offender
recidivism: what works! Criminology, 34(4): 575-607.
Glaze, L. & Bonczar, T. (2006). Probation and parole in the United States, 2005. Bureau of
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Hanson, K. & Bussiere, M. (1998). Predicting relapse: A meta-analysis of sexual offender
recidivism studies. Journal of Consulting and Clinical psychology, 66, 348-362.
Joplin, L., Bogue, B., Campbell, N., Carey, M., Clawson, E., et al. (2004). Using an integrated
model to implement evidence-based practices in corrections. Boston, MA: Crime and Justice
Institute.
Kappeler, V., Blumberg, M., & Potter, G. (2000). The mythology of crime and criminal justice.
Prospect Heights, IL: Waveland Press, second edition.
Langan, P. (1994). Between prison and probation: intermediate sanctions. Science, 262(May):
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Langan, P, Schmitt, E., & Durose, M. (2003). Recidivism of sex offenders released from prison
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versus Faddism and Circular Policy Development. Corrections Today, 65 (3): 46-50.
Paparozzi, M. (2007). Personal communication with author. January, 2007.
Paparozzi, M. & Hinzman, G. (2005). Caseload Size in Probation and Parole. Question: Is There
an Ideal Size? Answer: Yes, But Only if Results Matter. Perspectives, 29 (2): 23-25.
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Petersilia, J. (2003). When prisoners come home. New York: Oxford University Press.
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Robinson, L. (2003). Sex offender management: The public policy challenges. Annals of New
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Taxman, F., Young, D., & Byrne, J. (2003).Transforming offender reentry into public safety:
Lessons from OJP's Reentry Partnership Initiative. Justice Research and Policy, 5(2): 101-128.
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APPENDIX I
CONDITIONS OF SUPERVISION AND WORKLOAD ALLOCATION
Your Community Corrections Agency
1. Which of the following best describes your community corrections agency?
____Probation only
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____Parole only
____Probation and Parole
____Other, please list type _____________________________________________________
2. Approximately how many years have you worked in the field of community corrections? ____
3. Please indicate the title of your current position______________________________________
4. Which of the following best describes how many people live in the jurisdiction your agency serves?
____More than 300,000
____150,000 to 300,000
____75,000 to 150,000
____50,000 to 75,000
____30,000 to 50,000
____10,000 to 30,000
____Less than 10,000
5a.Which of the following best describes the jurisdiction your agency serves?
____Rural
____Suburban
____Urban
____Other, please specify _____________________________________________________
5b.What is the zip code of the department you serve:
________________________Zip Code
6. Approximately how many full-time community corrections officers are employed by your agency?
__________
7. Over the past two years, has the number of full-time community corrections officers in your agency
decreased as a direct result of budgetary concerns?
____Yes (how many officers were eliminated _____)
____No
8. Are the officers in your agency represented by a union?
____Yes
____No
9. Using a scale ranging from one (1 = least important) to ten (10 = most important), please rank each of
the following goals of supervision:
____Character or moral reformation
____Therapy and rehabilitation
____Reintegration with community
____Offender monitoring
____Holding offenders accountable (i.e., punishment)
____Victim protection
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____Community safety
Workload and Caseload Allocation
10. Does your agency conduct periodic reports quantifying workload assignments?
____Yes
____No
11. Does your agency measure workload by applying differential time values based upon offender risk
scores (such that offenders deemed more likely to reoffend receive more attention)?
____Yes
____No
12. Which of the following best describes how work is assigned in your agency?
____Workload Model (i.e., based upon determination of time needed for all tasks)
____Caseload Model (i.e., based upon total number of offenders supervised)
____Other model, please specify________________________________________________
13. Using a scale ranging from one (1 = least important) to ten (10 = most important), please rank the
importance of each of the following when determining conditions of supervision within your agency:
____Risk assessment
____Criminal history
____Uniform conditions determined by type of offense
____Court or releasing authority designs conditions
____Needs assessment
14. Please indicate the approximate average number of hours per month an officer in your agency
spends with each of the following tasks:
Conducting home visits
hours per month
hours per month
Verifying collateral contacts
hours per month
Receiving training
Performing administrative tasks
hours per month
Drug tests
hours per month
hours per month
Motivational interviewing
Verifying employment
hours per month
hours per month
Court appearances
Substitute or backup coverage
hours per month
Inter- or Intra-state transfer—in
hours per month
hours per month
Inter- or Intra-state transfer—out
Pre-sentence investigations
hours per month
Processing technical violations
hours per month
Other, please indicate
hours per month
15. Using a scale ranging from one (1 = least important) to ten (10 = most important), please rank the
importance of the following officer tasks:
____Conducting home visits
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____Verifying collateral contacts
____Receiving training
____Performing administrative tasks
____Drug tests
____Motivational interviewing
____Verifying employment
____Court appearances
____Substitute or backup coverage
____Inter- or Intra-state transfer—in
____Inter- or Intra-state transfer—out
____Pre-sentence investigation
____Processing technical violations
____Other, please indicate_____________________________________________________
16a. Would you say that your current caseload is:
____Much too large
____Slightly too large
____About the correct size
____Slightly too small
____Much too small
16b. Would you say that your current workload is:
____Much too large
____Slightly too large
____About the correct size
____Slightly too small
____Much too small
17. Approximately how many offenders are on the caseload you currently supervise?
________________________offenders on my caseload
18. Given your workload duties, approximately how many offenders do you feel you can adequately
supervise on a general caseload?
___________________________number of offenders
Sex Offenders and High-Risk Supervision
19. Does your department have specific policies, programs, and/or procedures targeting sex offenders
and other high-risk offenders?
____Yes (about what year did they begin___________?)
____No
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20. Has your agency assigned specific officer(s) to oversee policies, programs, and/or procedures
specifically targeting high risk offenders?
____Yes (about how many officers are assigned to high risk offenders__________)
____No
21. Please check any of the following activities conducted or contracted by your agency to supervise
sex-offenders and other high-risk offenders.
____Polygraph tests
____Hired new personnel
____Penile plethysmograph
____GPS or other electronic monitoring device
____Mandatory treatment
____Other______________________________________________ (please specify)
____None
22. Have high risk offender initiatives resulted in:
____Increased workload
____Workloads have remained the same
____Workloads have decreased
____Other______________________________________________ (please specify)
____None
23. Does your agency require additional annual training credits for officers supervising sex offenders?
____Yes (approximately how many hours are required ______________?)
____No
24. Would you say that your department has altered its central mission, goal, or purpose in response to
high risk offenders? If no, please skip to question number 25.
____Yes
____No
24a. If yes to question 24, how would you characterize this change in mission, goal, or purpose?
25. Is your agency required by legislation to use any electronic monitoring devices to supervise sex
offenders?
____Yes
____No
26. Approximately how many sex offenders and other high-risk offenders are supervised by the agency
in which you serve?
_____________number of sex offenders on supervision
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_____________number of non-sex related high-risk offenders on supervision
Clarification of Survey Responses and Comments to APPA
In the space provided below please take the opportunity to provide clarification on any of your responses
to questions on this survey or to make comments to APPA. Simply list the question number and your
statement of clarification or just write your comments.
______________________________________________________________________________
______________________________________________________________________________
______________________________________________________________________________
______________________________________________________________________________
______________________________________________________________________________
______________________________________________________________________________
______________________________________________________________________________
______________________________________________________________________________
Request of Copies of Departmental Written Policies
We would appreciate viewing workload-caseload policies developed by your agency or evaluations your
agency has conducted. Please send documents you are willing to share in an email with “workloadcaseload” in the subject line to mdemichele@csg.org.
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